Snow Falling on Cedars

David Guterson

Chapters 4–6

Chapters 7–10, page 2

page 1 of 3

Summary: Chapter 7

We learn that the Japanese residents of San Piedro first
came to the island in the early 1880s, most
of them penniless. Many found work in the nearby Port Jefferson
lumber mill. After the mill closed, they made a living growing strawberries
on their own land or as sharecroppers. However, the law forbade
noncitizens from owning land and also forbade the naturalization
of foreign-born Asian immigrants as United States citizens. Despite
these official prejudices, San Piedro made one attempt, annually,
to bridge the gap between races. Each summer, a girl of Japanese
descent was chosen to be the strawberry princess at the island’s
Strawberry Festival. Despite the institutional and informal prejudices
they faced, the Japanese-American residents of San Piedro were crucial
to the local economy as laborers. They carved a niche for themselves
in the island’s society and prospered—until they were evacuated
on March 29, 1942,
and sent to internment camps in California and Montana.

Hatsue’s mother, Fujiko, had come to America and married
Hatsue’s father, Hisao Imada, without knowing anything about him.
A baishakunin, or professional matchmaker, had arranged the wedding,
telling Fujiko that Hisao was a wealthy man. Fujiko felt angry and
betrayed when she met Hisao in Seattle and learned he was penniless.
Nonetheless, she chose to remain in America, and together she and
her husband worked hard at menial jobs, eventually growing to love
each other.

In the courtroom, the Japanese-Americans sit together
in the back of the gallery, Hatsue among them. She wishes to speak
to her husband alone, but the deputy, Abel, forbids her. We learn
that Hatsue has started to feel old and now wears makeup. When she
was thirteen, her parents sent her to a woman named Mrs. Shigemura for
training in manners and social graces. Mrs. Shigemura told her to
avoid white men.

We also learn that Hatsue met and married Kabuo while
they were in an internment camp. They were married in a small ceremony.
On their wedding night, they slept together in one half of her family’s
room, separated from the others only by a wool blanket and the noise
of a radio. There, they had sex for the first time, but with little
privacy. Eight days later, Kabuo left to volunteer for the U.S. Army,
against Hatsue’s wishes.

Summary: Chapter 8

The narrative flashes back again, this time to Ishmael’s
childhood. Ishmael remembers how he and Hatsue played on the beach together
as children. When they were ten, they kissed for the first time,
holding on to a glass-bottomed box Ishmael often used to look under
the surface of the water of the island’s tide pools. The kiss was innocent
and awkward. Ishmael kissed Hatsue again when they were fourteen.
This kiss was more serious; Hatsue stood still and then ran away.
They did not speak to each other for ten days, but Ishmael hid in
the forest outside Hatsue’s house in the evenings, hoping to catch
a glimpse of her.

Then, after a day spent harvesting strawberries, Ishmael
followed Hatsue to her home. It was raining, but instead of going
home she ducked into a hollowed-out cedar tree in the forest. Hatsue
had seen Ishmael following her, so she invited him inside to dry
out. When Ishmael apologized for kissing her, she replied that she
was not sorry. She worried about the controversy their relationship might
cause in the community, and then she kissed him. Ishmael felt an
overwhelming joy, but also a fear that he might never experience such
a moment again.